Undocumented Students Face Loss of In-State Tuition

Growing up in South Texas, Kendra always dreamed of becoming a doctor or a nurse. When she graduated from high school and enrolled at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, she said she spent her entire first year trying to connect with her professors and asking for opportunities to shadow clinicians.

Kendra, now 21, was born in Mexico and came to the United States with her parents when she was 9. (Kendra asked to be identified by her first name only.) She knew that being in the country without authorization would make it difficult for her to land the clinical placements necessary for most medical education programs—but it didn’t stop her from trying.

Halfway through her freshman year, President Donald Trump took office for the second time. Kendra said her family feared immigration enforcement raids and warned her not to go anywhere she didn’t need to go. She did her best not to let it distract her from her studies. But she said she was shocked when she learned last summer that the Texas Dream Act was in jeopardy.

The law, which made undocumented students eligible to pay in-state tuition rates, was the only reason Kendra could afford to go to college. Without it, she wouldn’t be able to stay at UTRGV. “That can’t happen,” she said.

But it did. In June 2025, the Department of Justice sued the state, arguing the law discriminated against U.S. citizens in other states. Texas quickly capitulated, and a district judge blocked the law. An appeals court later upheld the ruling.

Kendra was forced to reassess everything.

“You go from feeling like you’re worth it to feeling like complete crap,” Kendra said. “It doesn’t only affect the money.”

Kendra is one of more than 120,000 undocumented college students who have lost access to in-state tuition because of Department of Justice lawsuits in Texas, as well as Oklahoma, Nebraska, Kentucky and Illinois.

Since then, as part of the Trump administration’s wide-ranging anti-immigration campaign, the DOJ has filed lawsuits against similar policies in 20 other states, putting more than 218,000 more undocumented students at risk of losing their in-state tuition eligibility, according to data from the Higher Education Immigration Portal.

The DOJ’s lawsuits argue that offering in-state tuition to undocumented students gives them an unfair advantage over U.S. citizen students from other states, and incentivizes illegal immigration.

But advocates say such policies offer a pathway for young people who want to study and get good jobs so they can contribute to their communities. If they have to pay out-of-state tuition prices, a college education can quickly become out of reach.

Miriam Feldblum, president and CEO of the Presidents’ Alliance on Higher Education and Immigration, said maintaining the policies is a matter of fairness and consistency; before Trump took office for the second time, 25 states and Washington, D.C., allowed undocumented students to pay in-state tuition rates.

“The administration is targeting higher education access and affordability for undocumented students in ways that make no economic, educational or national sense,” Feldblum said. “We should use all the tools in our toolbox to strengthen our states’ economies.”

Just because in-state tuition has been struck down in some states doesn’t necessarily mean it won’t survive elsewhere, Feldblum said. The policies are all a little different, which can work to their advantage, she said.

“We don’t know yet what is going to happen with all the lawsuits,” she said. “The courts can really reach different conclusions based on the specific laws and the questions presented.”

‘It’s Just Not Fair’

The experience of students like Kendra offers a glimpse into how disruptive the policy change can be for noncitizen students, many of whom were brought to the U.S. as children.

After the Texas policy was struck down, Kendra took several months off from school and even briefly considered going back to Mexico, where she thought she might have more educational and career opportunities. Eventually, she decided to stay in the U.S. and transfer to South Texas College, where her scholarship from TheDream.US covers much more than it would have at the four-year university. Instead of premed, she’s now pursuing an associate degree in child development.

Although she’s at a new school, Kendra said she takes a bus to the UTRGV campus to study with her friends who are still students there. She asks them to tell her what they’re learning in their classes so that if she ever goes back, she won’t be far behind, she said.

Susan Collins, chief of staff and government affairs at TheDream.US, which offers scholarships to undocumented students, said that after the Texas Dream Act was struck down, her organization scrambled to help students like Kendra transfer to other colleges. “But at the end of the day, it’s not a solution,” she said.

“The ongoing fight over the tuition-equity question just underscores the need for a permanent federal solution that finally puts Dreamers on a path to citizenship and full inclusion,” Collins said.

Not all students who lost access to in-state tuition have transferred. Some, including 22-year-old Beth, fought hard to stay.

Beth was about to start her senior year as a strategic communications major at the University of Houston when she learned the Texas Dream Act was ending. She said she cried almost every day as she tried to figure out what she had to do to get the credits she needed to graduate.

“You don’t understand, I can’t transfer to a different university,” said Beth, a pseudonym. “All the things that I’ve built at the University of Houston, all my leadership, all my volunteer hours, all my connections—I can’t just let them go.”

Beth, who was brought to the United States when she was just a year old, said she took on work on campus, did freelance design work and borrowed money from her mother to pay her tuition bill, which went from roughly $6,000 to $14,000 per semester.

“It’s just very frustrating because … I don’t drink. I don’t do drugs. I don’t get in fights. I don’t do anything wrong. I’m always there helping out people,” Beth said. “It’s just not fair.”

Despite the financial burden, extra work and added stress brought on by the policy change, she managed to graduate on time in May.

Others may not be so fortunate.

Wil Del Pilar, senior vice president at EdTrust, a research and advocacy nonprofit, said the DOJ lawsuits are creating confusion for undocumented students and their families across the country—not only in the states where the policies have changed.

“I think it’s incredibly shortsighted to limit access to education and training to a group that may be your next group of inventors or they may be your next superstar scientists,” Del Pilar said. “You’re limiting a talented group of individuals from achieving all the things they could do not only to uplift their communities but to uplift society.”